| Golden Silence |
|
|
|
|
Dear Church Family, Quiet has always been a rare commodity in our house, a middle-of-the night event (unless one of the kids is up sick or nightmarish, which is often). When it happens, that odd and fleeting moment when telephones aren’t ringing, appliances aren’t humming and eight people aren’t jockeying for supremacy in the Conversation Olympics—it seems—odd. It seems—unnatural. It seems—wonderful. I have started taking a yoga class, and while I know it is still mid-January I am absolutely positive that this resolution will last for the rest of my life. Or till mid-February at least. My favorite part of class is the time at the beginning and end of class, when we just lie there on our mats and breathe. Quiet. Peace and quiet. It’s amazing. Where have they been keeping this? But silence is an acquired taste. I’m so unused to it that after a short while it is hard to maintain. I have been trained to avoid awkward social silences so well that any silence of longer than about 10 seconds feels awkward. If you are searching for a word to complete your thought, watch out! Here I come, with the very word you are searching for! Or a word I think fits! Doesn’t matter! My older kids do a hilarious and dead-on imitation of me attempting a “Godly Play” exercise, the kind Dawn Stewart favored, with hand-crafted wooden figures representing Bible characters moving oh, so slooowwwllly across a landscape of felt. Dawn would intone “I wonder...” and let the words hang in the air, quite content with the lengthy silence that most often followed. Sheridan and Evan portray their mother whipping out the felt, frantically hurling little wooden figures into the air and snapping at an imaginary group of stunned children, “It’s Jesus! OK? Jesus! And these are the wise men? And what does this mean? Anyone? OK, I’ll tell you—they’re looking for God. Any questions? Good!” And I howl sheepishly in recognition. I am not a quiet girl. But...on those occasions (such as yoga class) when silence is more or less imposed upon me, I have to admit something magic begins to happen. An awareness begins to set in, a calm and appreciative consciousness of my body, my mind, my heart. I gaze at a flickering candle, I settle into my most secret thoughts. And in that silence, I can feel the warm, welcome and patient presence of God. A God who has been waiting, waiting for the longest time, for me to just be quiet for a minute. And so the silence becomes a time to glimpse Heaven. To get a glimmer of what full communion with the universe and my Creator must feel like. It feels strange, yes. But it feels like a gift. We offer you this gift during the time of Lent. Join us for Wednesday night soup suppers, certainly a fondly anticipated time of terrific food and rather “vocal” fellowship. But then, come up to the chancel and experience something else with us. Something you, too, may get precious little of the rest of your week. Experience candles, soft music, soft prayers. And silence. Taizé prayer, inspired by the services held in the Taizé monastic community in France, provides an opportunity to be still, and to listen for the words of love and encouragement God longs to whisper just to you. We hope you will treasure these weekly nuggets of time to be quiet together, listening for the voice of our God. Shhhh!! |
| < Prev | Next > |
|---|